Method and means of producing heat



Au 26 .1924. v 1,506,323

J. PL C)'P1EHL.L

METHOD AND MEANS OF PRODUCING HEAT Filed Dec. 5. 1919 x /72 ven for Patented Aug. 26,1924. 7

' STATES JOHN HUGH ONEILI, OF SPRINGFIELD, MISSOURI.

mnon AND means or rnonucme 1mm.

Application filed December 5, 1919. Seriallo. 342,833.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, JoHN HUGH ONnnm, a citizenof the United States, and resident of Springfield, Missouri, have invented new and useful Improvements in Methods and Means of Producing Heat away from atmospheric air, which are fully set forth in the following specification and which are a continuation of the basic invention disclosed in my application Serial No. 269,268, filed January 2, 1919, entitled Method and means of generating power, and also disclosed in other applications filed concurrently herewith, and bearing Serial Numbers 342,832 and 342,834.

The applications referred to relate to the combustion of metal or other fuel, away from the oxygen of the atmosphere, by combining it with a stored combustion supporting gas or a carrier of such gas or gases; the fuel to be either stored in the combustion chamber and the comburent introduced as desired or both elements introduced simultaneously.

The present application covers a class of new and definite methods which are an improvement on the process known as the thermit reaction in which the comburent and the fuel metal are both dry, in a finely divided state, and intimately mixed.

The invention consists primarily in the method and means of producing heat by first mixing together a fuel or'fuels with one or more suitable comburents then introducing the mixture at a go erned rate into a suitable combustion chamber with or without modification of the mixture by the injection of water or any other comburents as the mixture chamber.

Further features of the invention consist in the use of liquid and'solid fuels, of liquid and solid comburent, inthe arrange ments for introducin the elements ofcombustion, in the regu ation and disposal of the combustion roducts, in the types of combustion cham ers or furnaces used, and

in the means of bringing the system immediately tov operating heat-and condition.

Another feature of the invention consists in using a carrier! or mixture of carriers of combustion sustaining gasor gases which are in whole or in part liquid or liquefiable, with a fuel or mixture of fuelswhich are in whole or in part li uid or powdered or in the form of grains.

approaches. the combustion th elements may be mixed together into a liquid or mush or paste which can be conveyed, pumped extruded or otherwise conveniently introduced at a governed rate, into a combustion chamber where they react with the production of heat away from atmospheric air. This heat can be applied to any desired use such as heating a furnace, producing a motive fluid, or manufacturing water gas or other gases. The reaction can very conveniently be car: med on under pressure since all the necessary combustion materials are in a compact liquid orsolid form and the changing in whole or in part to the gaseous state as a result of the reaction may be made to yield any desired pressure.

In the production of motive fluid or of water gas or in similar processes the react-- ing mixture may be composed of a fuel or fuels in liquid, granular, pulverized, or other form and with a carrier or carriers which contain part or all of the combustion sustaining gas. A sufliciency or a superfluity of water, or solution of gas carrier, may be added in the form of vapor or liquid between the pump and the combustion chamber, thus making sure that oxygen is supplied to the reaction in not less than equivalent proportion without making the mixture too wet for convenient handling and also insuring that the reaction does not travel back through the introducing .pipe and devices to the storage container.

Fuels may be any material that will react with a positive heat value such as the alkali and alkali earth. metals, lithium, rubidium,

potassium, barium, strontium, sodium, bo-"" ron, calcium, SlllCOIl, magnesium, aluminum, etc., carbons such as charcoal, coal or coke, hydrocarbons including gases'that can be stored as liquids under pressure, animal, vegetable and mineral oils, fats, waxes,- and tars, spirits, alcohols, others, esters, naphtha,

gasoline, acetone, solutions of acetylene in acetone, sulphur, phosphorus, sugar, shellac,

glucose, etc. Some of these fuels are solid and may be reduced to fluid or mush form by grinding, by solution, or by'heat, or by a combination of these methods.

comburents include a very large number of compounds the principal of which are compounds of oxygen or chlorine. Hydro n, nitrogen, fluorine, bromine are of much ess importance 'exce t where combined with oxygen or chlorlne or both. Among the r Combustion supporting gas carriers or most useful combustion supporters are the oxids of metals, including the peroxides of potassium, sodium, calc1u rn,.ma'gnesium, barium, strontium, lithium, manganese, and the heptoxide of .manganese, also the nitrites and nitrates including ammonium nitrate, nitrates of above named metals, nitrite and nitrate of iron, also the chlorates and sulphates. The most useful combustion supporters are the liquid gas carriers such as water, hydrogen peroxide, nitrogen tetroxide, nitric-acld, hydrochloric acid, sulphuric acid, etc.

In the manufacture of water gas the blowing up of the fire may be dispensed with by feeding in a metal or metallic substance or alloy having a plus heat reaction with water, along with a carbon or hydrocarbon in such proportion that the loss of heat in decomposing water and transferring its oxygen to form carbon monoxide will be approximately balanced b the plus heat of the metal reaction. is would also yield hydrogen gas to the mixture.

In applying my method of producing heat for the production of a motive fluid, a typical reaction is that between ammonium nitrate and an .alloy of magnesium and aluminum with a resultant plus heat value of 2263 calories per gramor 407 3 B. T. U. per pound of materials which allows of a large heat value to vaporize water. The nitrogen and hydrogen may be vented outside the boiler through a feed water heater and the heat of the reaction transferred through a transfer wall to water, thus making a straight steam cycle; or the gases may be vented int(l the, steam space making a gas-steam eye 0.

For bringin this system into operative condition a ca culated amount of thermit may be used and this maybe ignited by any of the usual methods such as the electric spark or the percussion cap. For' instantaneous delivery of power from a cold system a nitrate thermit is well suited. It is particularly rapid because the gaseous waste products which ma be nitrogen or a-mixture of nitrogen an hydrogen, or a mixture of nitrogen, hydrogen and steam, are immediately available in calculated quantity as motivefluid.

The fuels, oxygen carriers or other com-' burents and cycles can be varied and combined in almost innumerable ways without departing from the spirit of my invention. One arrangement of the ap aratus for carrying out my invention is i' ustrated in the accompanying drawings in which Fig. 1 is a' diagrammatic view in longitudinal section showing one arrangement of the apparatus, and Fig. 2 is a detail showing an alternative construction for a part thereof. 7

In the drawing 1 is a steam boiler surrounding a steam space 2 between a heater pot, or fire tube 3 which encloses the' refractory lined combustion chamber 4. The boiler 1 is provided with gland packings at 5 and 6. In the combustion chamber 4 there .isa container 7 made vof aluminum or other combustible metal or -material, and filled packing 14 being provided to prevent leakage along the screw. The container 10 is surrounded by a jacket 15 for supplying heat to the'rnixture. The lunger 11 forces the fuel mixture from t e container .10

through the tube 16 to the combustion' chamber 4 at a rate determined by the speed of rotation of the screw 13.

In operation the firing pin 9 -detonates the percussion charge 8, the thermit combusts, the container 7 melts and combusts, the hot gases disrupt the seal 17 by heat or pressure and pass to the steam space *2, then to the steam collectoror dryer 18, and thence through a pipe 19 to a prime mover. The prime mover may drive the screw 13 through suitable transmission devices to move the plunger piston-wise. The fuel mixture will constantly enter thecombustion chamber through the tube 16 and there- 'by continuously support combustion. The

feeding mechanism illustrated diagrammatically by 13 and 11 may be driven at any fixed speed, at the prime-mover speed or at any other desired or varied speed and the changes in the speed thereof may be accomplished by any suitable manual, or automatic means. This rate may be regulated by the ressure in the boiler or may be so operate that it will be the equivalent ofa throttle on the prime mover. i A water pump 20 is driven by the primemover or by other means at any regulated or varied-speed, automatically regulated or otherwise. It su plies water through the tube 21 to the boiler at 22 and also if desired, to the fuel admision tube at 23. The amount of water admitted to the fuel may be manually regulated by a valve 2 1% to a fixed calibrated amount proportionate used, or it may be automatically controlled by pressure orby temperature orboth.

The feed-water passing through pipe 21 s preheated in the' gas collector 25 which 1s supplied with water or :steam clrculating to the fuel x through the pipes 26 and 27 connected with the boiler. The relatively cooler feed water causes the collection of non-condensible gas or air atboiler pressure. This gas passes through the tube 28 to the fuel container 10, thus equalizing the pressure in fuel container and combustion chamber 4 i Fig. 2 shows one of many possible alternative expedients for the pumping of the fuel to the combustion chamber in which 29 is the pump driven by any suitable means, and 30 is an agitator, for effectively breaking up any lumped or caked masses of the fuel.

What I claim is:

-1. The method of producing heat away from, atmospheric air which consists in mixing a pulverized fuel with a normally solid comburent applying heat to the mixture to melt the comburent and reduce the mixture to a soft mushy condition, conveying the soft mixture at a overned rate' to a combustion chamber we ich has been previously heated to temperature above the ignition point of the mixture.

2. The method of producing heat away from atmospheric air by burning at a de sired rate a fuel with a comburent, in which said fuel and said comburent are mixed and stored in a container, applying heat to the mixtur'e so as to soften it, conveying the soft mixture at a governed rate from said con-.

tainer through a connection to a combustion chamber which has been previously heated to a. temperature above the ignition point of the mixture, introducing water or other liquid into the mixture as to thin said mixture, add comburent, and control the temperature of the combustion. I

3. The method ofproducin a motive fluid away from atmospheric air w 'ch conslsts 1n mixing a fuel with a comburent to form a wet, soft or mushy mixture, starting-combustion in a chamber to produce a temperature sufiicient to start' sombustion of said mixture, feeding said mixture at a governed rate to said combustion chamber, applying the heat from said combustion chamber to a body of water for thepurpose of vaporizing the water and superheatmg the resulting steam, and mixing the gaseous products of combustion with said steam to further superheat the same and to form a mixed motive fluid.

4. An apparatus for generating motive fluid away from atmospheric air including a -shell forming a boiler, a structure within said shell and spaced away therefrom to form a water and steam space, means includin 'a charge of hi hly inflammable material or starting com ustion in said chamber, a containeradapted to hold a mixed fuel and comburent, means for heating said container to kee the fuel mixture in a soft or mushy. condltion, means for extrudi the mushy fuel from said container to sai combustion chamber. I

5. An ap aratus for generating motive fluid iifcludmga shell forming a boiler, a

structure forming acombustion chamber located therein and spaced away from the shell to form a water and steam space, means for initially starting combustion in said chamber, a fuel 'container, means for extruding fuel from said container into said combustion chamber and means for supplying a regulated quantity of water to the fuel as it is being extruded.

In witness whereof I have hereunto signed my name.

JOHN HUGH ONEIL'L. 

